 Women in political power and school closure during COVID times*Natalia Danzer, Sebastian Garcia-Torres, Max Steinhardt () and Luca Stella Economic Policy, 2024, vol. 39, issue 120, 765-810 Abstract: SummaryThis study explores the relationship between women’s representation in political power and school closures during the coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19). Using a cross-country dataset in Europe, we document a striking negative relationship between the share of female members in national governments and school closures. We show that a one-standard deviation increase in female members of national governments is associated with a significant reduction in the likelihood of school lockdowns by 24% relative to the average share of school closures. This result is robust to an extensive set of sensitivity checks. We attribute this pattern to a higher awareness of female politicians about the potential costs that school closures imply for families, in particular working mothers with young children. Keywords: H52; I18; I20; J13; J16 (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oup:ecpoli:v:39:y:2024:i:120:p:765-810. Access Statistics for this article Economic Policy is currently edited by Ghazala Azmat, Roberto Galbiati, Isabelle Mejean and Moritz Schularick More articles in Economic Policy from CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po Contact information at EDIRC., CES Contact information at EDIRC., MSH Contact information at EDIRC. |
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